11 Jews killed in Russian crash

Russia’s chief rabbi traveled to Perm, Russia to lead the funerals of 11 Jews who died in a plane crash.

A passenger jet crashed early Sunday morning during its descent into central Russia, killing all 88 passengers, including at least 11 members of the local Jewish community.

The flight, operated by a subsidiary of Aeroflot, was en route from Moscow to Perm, a city in the Ural Mountains in central Russia when it crashed at 3:10 a.m.

There were four Jewish families with three children among the 88 who died in the crash.

The flight recorders from the Boeing 737 Aeroflot Nord flight were damaged in the crash and it may take several weeks to determine the cause, the Interfax news agency reported.

Investigators have ruled out terrorism as a possible cause for the crash. Witnesses reported seeing the airplane on fire before it crashed onto a section of the Trans-Siberian railway in an unpopulated area of the city.

A delegation from the Chabad-led Federation of Jewish Communities, including Russia’s chief Chabad Rabbi Berel Lazar, traveled to Perm to assist in the funerals of the victims.

The Jewish victims were Yevgeny and Lyudmila Sankin, 50 and 53; Anna Spivak and Yakov Spivak, both 32; Sergei Yudin and Valeriya Yudin, 41 and 3; and Ifraim Nakhumov and Golda Nakhumova, 36 and 24, with their children, Ilya Nakhumov, 7, and Eva Nakhumov, 5.